Producing beautiful, insta-ready photos with a smartphone used to be a hassle. How many times have you found yourself trying to take the perfect shot over and over again then later spending hours for post editing?
It’s no wonder HUAWEI’s P30 Series has been stirring up hype, as the latest flagship series allows you to take outstanding pictures effortlessly by fully utilizing its Pro Mode – so good the shots are comparable to DSLR quality!
When you switch to “Pro Mode” on the P30 camera for the first time, the different numbers and codes of the settings may feel convoluted at first, but with the right setting, skill and subject, you can produce professional photography even without a DSLR.
First of all, here are some 101 elements of the Pro Mode you need to know. If you’re already exposed to manual photography, these terms won’t be a stranger to you, as the Pro Mode functions work similarly to a basic DSLR setting.
ISO - Light Sensitivity
ISO controls how sensitive your camera is to light, in other words, how bright or dark your photo is. The higher the ISO value, the brighter your photo will become. Thus, increasing your ISO is especially helpful in darker environments or during night time, but be careful not to overdo it as an ISO that is too high will result in a lot of grain, or noise in your picture.
Shutter speed, by definition, represents how long your camera shutter stays open to expose light to the sensor, which affects mainly the sharpness of your object. A fast shutter speed captures instant stills and freezes fast moving objects or actions, like a moving car or a flying bird. On the other hand, a long shutter speed can produce a dramatic motion blur effect.
EV - Exposure
When we are taking photos outdoors, it’s common to receive overexposed or underexposed outcomes due to the unpredictable sunlight. Adjusting the Exposure Value (EV) will help us balance the light and dark components of the image when too much sunlight is getting into the frame.
AF - Auto Focus
If you’re concerned about out-of-focus or blurry subjects in your shots, the AF is a helpful tool to make sure that the subject or object in your frame always stays in focus.
WB - Auto White Balance
White balance stands for the colour temperature of your picture. The P30 comes with several automatic white balance settings that are designed for different weather and light conditions (cloudy / daylight etc.) Use this to adjust how warm or cool the colour of your image is.
The HUAWEI P30 Series also comes with three metering options for you to choose based on your photography needs. Metering is a method of how your camera learns to configure the right shutter speed is based on the amount of light and ISO it detects. The three different options vary by the range of the picture where metering is applied:
- Spot metering: only an isolated single focus point is evaluated while the surrounding frame will be ignored.
- Center-weighted averaging metering: the light in the middle range instead of one focus point is evaluated, ignoring corners of the frame.
- Multi-zone evaluative metering: the entire frame is first split into multiple zones to be evaluated individually.
Now that you’ve covered the basics, the rest of the job is just fiddling with the settings and see what works best for your liking. Not sure where to start? Here are some sample stunning shots - all taken via the P30 Pro’s Pro Mode - for you to try out yourself following the metadata!
If you’ve successfully created your photographic masterpiece, try your luck in winning $20,000 USD (RM83,400) and a Huawei P30 Pro smartphone by submitting your work to the Next Image photography competition. Consisting of 6 conceptual categories (as in above picture), the HUAWEI NEXT-IMAGE Awards aspires to encourage mobile users to unleash their creativity and explore the possibilities of next-generation visual expressions.
All that is required to participate is your best shot taken with a HUAWEI smartphone and your submission to this page: https://gallery.consumer.huawei.com/en/
If you’re looking to lay your hands on a brand new P30 & P30 Pro, now will be a good time to purchase as the Huawei Online Official store is offering many deals and surprises during Ramadhan season. One that we find to be super irresistible is the complimentary Wireless Charging Case and Wireless Charger giveaway along with the purchase of a Huawei P30; if you are getting a Huawei P30 Pro, you will receive a Huawei Talkband B5 worth RM599 instead.
Additionally, any purchase above the amount of RM1,500 will entitle you to a lucky draw opportunity to win two roundtrip tickets to Tokyo! As the Huawei P30 & P30 Pro are priced at RM2,699 and RM3,799 respectively, you will automatically be eligible for the lucky draw when you get the phone. Check out https://shop.huawei.com/my/ramadan-2019.html for more information.
